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Robin Roberts on Disease Fight: At One Point I Wanted to Die (VIDEO)

Published
3:04 PM PDT, April 22, 2014

Good Morning America co-host Robin Roberts is opening up in depth about her darkest moments during her battle with a bone marrow disease and reveals to ET in a new interview that at one point she felt like she "wanted to die."

"There was a time that I wanted to die -- I didn't know if I thought I would -- but I was in so much pain, so much anguish, discomfort -- my throat felt like I had swallowed a blow torch -- I couldn't swallow," Roberts, 53, told ET in an interview conducted by her dear friend, Cameron Mathison, about her bout with the disease myelodysplastic syndrome.

"All those things. So there was a time that I was like, 'Uncle, okay,
you know I've had a really good run, I've met popes and talked to
presidents. I have a beautiful family and I've done more than I ever
thought I could do."

"There was a real, real low point in the hospital... I couldn't eat, I was just really in a really bad way, and I was just tired," she recalled, having also just lost her mother a few weeks prior.

She described one particular moment when she drew strength from her mother after she had passed. "And I closed my eyes and I just felt this kind of slippage, like I was just going. And I kept hearing my name, and I finally opened my eyes and it was my nurse Jenny... and she was yelling my name, and I know it was my mom's voice. I am convinced it was my mom's voice. And not to go where she is, but to will me back to fight another day."

The GMA newswoman also said she has been amazed and touched with the outpouring of support she's received through her health ordeals. "There has not been one single day where someone comes up to me and says, 'I've prayed for you.' Not one day," she said. "My shoulders almost go down when people say you're so courageous, because they gave me the strength to want to fight."